


Dark Caranthir.

by hennethgalad



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Letter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:34:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25442497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hennethgalad/pseuds/hennethgalad
Summary: nuts
Comments: 2
Kudos: 18
Collections: Tolkien Gen Week 2020





	Dark Caranthir.

  
To my esteemed and beloved brother Maedhros   
From your loyal Caranthir

How are you? I wish mother were here, she would sing you to sleep again, and make you eat properly and you would soon be your old self again. Well, you will not listen to us! The only one you ever listen to (sometimes!) is Maglor but he's no use as a mother, when he looks up from his harp all he sees are notes of music dancing through the air!

There is news, brother, but you will not like it.  
I am writing this from Sarn Athrad, at the Riversmeet Inn. A strange gathering is taking place here, seemingly by chance. Firstly a larger than usual number of wood elves are camped in the naith. Secondly, the tavern is brimming with dwarves, and now elves. Thirdly, there are Onodrim here! I have seen one with my own eyes, and they say there are more among the chestnuts. The tavern still puts them in everything! (chestnuts, that is, not Onodrim. ha! that would be a sight!) I do like the pies though, I must say. I'll send some with the letter, I know you like them too!  
But fourthly, there are Avari here, fifty of them, from far far away to the south and east, past these mountains, and the other, longer chain, that the dwarves call Khazad-dûm, and twice as far again. So far that they say the stars are strange there. Everyone despised father for wandering around all the time, but all our journeys together were not so far as these Avari have come.  
Fifthly, then, the Enemy, it is clear, has plans that would ensnare all the world. His minions hold power openly in his name in many places, though elsewhere, as here, there are those who resist.  
Sixthly, alas, the Avari were told my name, and our stories. They would not meet with me, nor any of our people, nor have we been permitted to attend any of their gatherings. I fear that the restlessness and impatience of our father has served only to thwart his own will. These would make mighty allies, brother, and did they but know the valour of your heart, they would come to believe in you as I do. But they will not. 

These Avari... Their skin is different colours, oh, not like a butterfly, but the colours of horses, (except grey!) Some are as pale as we, others darker, some ruddy, others golden, and many shades of brown, and even one as black as this ink! Well, not so very black, a little browner than ink, but startling! I regret that when he and some friends came into the tavern, I was pointed out to him and his lip curled in contempt. I was almost overcome with one of my angry times, but I remembered my lessons and kept my seat, and someone gave me some miruvor, and it passed. Or at least lifted a little.

Oh Maedhros, I had dreams... I have not spoken of this because everyone has been so busy with the quest. But all the time, I have dreamed of travelling, of seeing all that there is to see, across the breadth of Arda to see Arien ride in splendour up the eastern sky! To see the great desert, the sea of sand, where the changing wind swallows towns whole, and spits them out, scoured to ruins... To find the site of Cuiviénen... To find the lost Avari...  
But they are here, and I am spared the trouble of that quest, for our name will spread, and they will turn us from their doors, or, like Thingol, from their very borders. My dream is lost. 

I am sorry to say this, after all you’ve endured, but I feel hollow without my dream. No. It was not a dream, it was my plan, my purpose, the wish of my heart. Do you remember when father said that breaking them would kill him? My dream is broken, brother, and I am fading, hollowed out. I have no hope. I have no hope that we shall retrieve them of course, but I suppose a part of me had hoped that we might just stop, or at least wait until we had built, or birthed (!) an army to face the enemy.  
But even should all your, our, wishes come true, and the jewels be once more in the hands of the sons of Fëanor, even then, we shall be looked on with loathing wherever we go.  
Do you think that the kin of the slain will welcome us back to Valinor?

Ah, I have not told you the worst of it. I sent a bottle of finest Tol Galen over to the Avari at the inn, with the message that we were not the enemy.  
They replied that those who do the work of the enemy do the work of the enemy.

And for the first time I wondered if that was the purpose of the enemy in stealing them. Not for the Light, since he hated it. No, I think he did it to make us fight amongst ourselves. 


End file.
